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John and Jeannie stopped in at Bigfoot before taking me down to Sea-Tac for the nighttime flight to Charlotte... |
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At Sea-Tac... |
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Connecting at Chicago Midway... |
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Arrival at Charlotte... |
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Mr. Coffee fetched me at Charlotte airport and delivered me to Strawberry Hill, where I was greeted by nephews and monkeys... |
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Beloved Mother and my brother-n-law, Engineer Matt... |
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Mr. Coffee... |
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Sister Jan and nephew Will... |
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Mother... |
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Father and Sister Jan... |
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Engineer Matt stands proudly with the new Hamilton kayak. Mother helped father up so that he could see the new kayak just outside the window... |
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Father absolutely loved Tom Billotto and the "Chet Atkins" finger style guitar that Tom plays so well... |
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Mr. Coffee and Sister Jan enjoy Tom's playing and humor... |
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It would be hard to find a finer person than Tom Billotto... |
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Tom with Father and Mother... |
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Strawberry Hill... Watching the Little Rascals... |
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Brother Brian and Joanne... and Brian's toy hauler... |
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At Strawberry Hill... Sister Jan and Will. Will reads way beyond his grade level... |
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Randy and Pete dropped in at Strawberry Hill... |
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Picking a few old tunes for Father... |
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Sister Jan's and Engineer Matt's first house, where they lived until moving into Hamilton Manor at Mountain Island Lake... |
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Farmwood... Father built this house in 1973 and it was the Thompson home until the move to Strawberry Hill in February of 2004... |
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Somerdale Lane... this was Mother and Father's first house together...Father built this house in 1960 and it was the Thompson home until 1973... |
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Back at Strawberry Hill, Pastors Page and Cummings of First Baptist Church stopped by to visit. Francis Davis, mother of Pete, also stopped by. Mrs. Davis presented Dr. Page with a prayer "Afghan." Like father, Dr. Page was also suffering from cancer... |
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My Father's parents, long ago... |
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Pastor Cummings, Father, and Pastor Page... |
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Pete also stopped in... |
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Father, at Strawberry Hill, just before I had to leave for the airport for my flight back to Seattle. I struggled to find the right words to describe this moment. I took this picture during the last few moments I was to have with my Father. Father and I sat together and I played "Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain" on the guitar - a tune that we had played together many times. I think we both knew that it would be the last time. The lines of that old song became my final goodbye to Father. We shook hands and parted... |
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Pete gave me a ride to the Charlotte airport for my long flight back to Seattle... |
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Connecting at Chicago Midway... |
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On to distant Seattle... |
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Not much in the mood for crowds, I peddled over to the Tinder Box and enjoyed some quiet time... and good conversation with Jeff the proprietor... |
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From the Tinder Box we observed a fine fireworks display being setoff at the Downtown Bellevue Park... |
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Bigfoot was parked a couple of blocks over, at Mamasan's, and I returned there as the last of the fireworks lit the sky... |
